The Same Three Minute Song Gave Both Of Them A Reason Not To Disappear
One was a star trying to find his way back toward the center of American radio and the other was a songwriter getting ready to walk away from music entirely
The rhinestones were not the point because the hunger was
Glen Campbell heard Rhinestone Cowboy on the radio and decided he had to record it and when he walked into Capitol Records to ask about the song an executive was already waiting to play him the very same record
By 1974 Campbell knew what it felt like when the lights moved somewhere else
He had already lived through Wichita Lineman and Galveston and television stardom and years as one of the most recognizable crossover singers of America
But the huge records had slowed and his personal life was becoming increasingly unsettled and Rhinestone Cowboy reached him at exactly the kind of moment its story described as a veteran still trying to find the lights again
The song belonged to Larry Weiss and Weiss had written and recorded it himself for his 1974 album Black and Blue Suite and his version failed to become a significant U.S. hit
Campbell heard it on Los Angeles radio and remembered the title even though he could not remember the name of the singer and became so taken with it that he learned the song while touring Australia
Al Coury Was Already Waiting With The Record
Then came the coincidence and back in Los Angeles Campbell walked into the office of Capitol executive Al Coury intending to pursue the song
Coury told him he had something Campbell needed to hear and he put on Rhinestone Cowboy and there was little left to debate
Campbell recorded it in early 1975 with producers Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter
Before Capitol had even fully launched the single Campbell performed it on a telethon and Los Angeles programmer Paul Drew saw the performance and obtained an acetate and began playing it across the RKO radio chain and helped force the label into an accelerated release
The result was bigger than a country comeback and Rhinestone Cowboy reached No. 1 on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the country chart and gave Campbell his first solo Hot 100 No. 1 after more than a decade of hits
For one week in September 1975 it topped both charts simultaneously and something no song had done since Big Bad John by Jimmy Dean in 1961
Larry Weiss Found A Reason Not To Walk Away
But Campbell was not the only career altered by the record because Larry Weiss had become so discouraged after his own album failed that he was considering leaving music and going into the furniture business
Then word arrived that Glen Campbell was cutting his song
Campbell heard the song and found a comeback and Weiss heard Campbell was recording it and found a reason not to walk away
So Rhinestone Cowboy ended up carrying two men at once and it turned the old show business dream into something more human as the sound of people still chasing light after disappointment had already taught them what darkness feels like